can't open an AVI file in editing software

[TeleVVizard]

I exported a simple clip out of SFM so I could open it in Cyberlink Media Suite Essentials Power Director 14 , but it won't open in any programs on my computer (Including Power Director). After doing some digging, I determined that the codecs (software used to compress and decompress files) that SFM uses aren't the same as the ones on my computer. Exporting the file as a sequence of PNG Images worked until I put them in Power Director, at which point each frame was ungodly long. SFM won't let me save the file as any other type. If anyone can either link me to the codec(s) that SFM uses, tell me how to save the file in another format, or tell me how to speed up a video in Power Director, it would be greatly appreciated.

[Marco Skoll]

SFM corrupts AVIs once they exceed a certain file size.

And any MP4/MOV rendering from SFM requires Quicktime, which is unreliable, buggy, exports with poor contrast and a known computer security risk.

Image sequences are the only stable and reliable option - but they are actually the recommended option for exporting renders (from any program). Exporting each frame separately ensures that the rendering program crashing (or the power going out) can't completely corrupt a video file and waste hours of rendering.

The problem is going to be about the frame rate you have set for the image sequence in Power Director. Unfortunately, I can't help with that (I don't use the software), although there are guides for how to do this in other programs. You may already have Blender (as it's a very useful tool for SFM anyway), so this might be of use:

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=375229570

[Zappy]

Are you able to change an image's duration in Cyberlink Media Suite Essentials Power Director 14? If so, are you able to change the duration of multiple images at the same time? If so, are you able to set the duration of all images to be one frame long (trying to set it by an amount of a second won't work correctly), and are you able to change the framerate (to match the same framerate as what you exported at from Source Filmmaker)?

If the answer is no to any of those things, you may have to use another video editor to combine the images and sound file into a video, which you can then maybe import into Cyberlink Media Suite Essentials Power Director 14.

A guide on doing that using Blender (which is free, is available on Steam, and can also be useful for other things) can be found below, but feel free to use any video editor that allows you to set the framerate of the images correctly (which basically just means "not Windows (Live) Movie Maker").
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=375229570
Source Filmmaker's direct video export implementations are very bad. AVI exports are uncompressed, so they easily reach the max file-size of about 4 gigabytes (at which point they will then corrupt), and MP4/MOV exports both look bad and require QuickTime, which is an actual security Risk for Windows[www.us-cert.gov] and should thus not be used. Which means that only image sequence exports are reliable and should be used. (See above.) (Though feel free to export as AVI/MP4/MOV from video editors; Only Source Filmmaker itself has such bad AVI/MP4/MOV implementations.)

[TeleVVizard]

thanks you guys, I didn't know that SFM corrupts AVI files. I think I'll try transfering the image sequence into a gif image that way it has a fixed framerate and I can keep it on the screen for only one loop. The sequence is only a couple of seconds long so it shouldn't be too hard. I'm planning on adding another clip that's a bit longer though so I think it would be beneficial to learn more about Power Director because I haven't used it that much. Thanks for the videos this should help with my problem.

[Zappy]

Originally posted by SpaceCadetStrawberry:

- I think I'll try transfering the image sequence into a gif image -

The GIF image format is limited to a 256 colour palette, while PNG images are "limited" to 16777216 colours. In other words, GIF images have a set colour palette and each pixel then uses 8 bits (256 colours) to decide which colour in the palette to use, while PNG isn't restricted to a palette, and instead has 24-bit "true colour" (8 bits/256 values for red, green, and blue, independantly, so 256*256*256 possible colours, which is 65536 times as many as GIF images support). The palette itself may be different for each frame, but still can not exceed 256 colours for a single image (possibly unless you layer individual frames on top of each other, but that's not something you should even bother trying).

GIF images can also only have images have a duration that's a multiple of 0.01 seconds, meaning that only a framerate of 100, 50, 25, 20, 10, 5, 4, 2, and 1 frame(s) per second can be correctly recreated in a Gif file, meaning that as your session probably (though not necessarily) is set up for 60, 30, or 24 frames per second, you can not correctly reproduce the timing (unless you manually set the timing of each frame individually, which you shouldn't want to do). This is also one of the main reasons Windows (Live) Movie Maker is anti-suggested for image sequence stitching, as it has the same problem, also being limited to image durations in multiples of 0.01 seconds.



TL;DR: Don't do that. GIF images don't support nearly as many colours in an image as PNG, and also can't have the framerate set up correctly in most cases.

You should really try to figure out some way to import an image sequence and set the framerate correctly, whether you do that using Cyberlink Media Suite Essentials Power Director 14 or another video editor.

[TeleVVizard]

Importing the image sequence into Power Director will only let me make each image 0.01 seconds long at the least so I have to either convert the images to a GIF or to another video format. I'm willing to sacrifice quality though because it's just going to be a short stupid thing, not looking to enter it into any contests or anything